2012
by daphno
Summary: She's never really stopped to consider the fact that there are armies out there willing to blow a hole in the galaxy. Or that, once upon a time, they were willing to use her to do it. (Apocalypse, ensemble cast including Cam & Vala, established S/J in later chapters).
1. Initiation

**The end of the world, from Cassie's perspective. Here's to the Alien Invasion of 2012!**

* * *

When the world ends Cassie is sick. Her eyes sting and her head pounds, and she starts seeing spaceships in the sky between star clusters and airplane halos, no bigger than her thumb from this distance.

"It'll never happen," said Uncle Jack, when she was twelve. "I'm almost certain," he amended, when she was sixteen.

She plays it off as part of the sickness, or shooting stars, or another hoax, and returns to her dorm to chew her way through noodles and ibuprofen, and gulp down an old remedy they had in 'Toronto', ginger and mint to taint the back of her throat.

That night, she watches news reports unfold, heresy and pseudoscience with a healthy dash of national panic. She isn't entirely sure what to do, and clenches her fingers in anticipation. She'd always assumed the world would just end, overnight or in a quick airstrike; she wasn't prepared for this hazy feeling of terror.

She tells her friends not to worry, and goes to bed. She hears them in the kitchen, vapid whispers going back and forth, unified in their panic. Cassie has never felt more adrift; she fit smoothly into Earth society in the early days, but she can't join them in shock that alien races exist.

She falls asleep in a flu-induced stupor in the early hours, and is woken by her phone's shrill ringing. She jabs the phone against her ear before she is properly awake. "Yeah?"

"Cassie!" It's Sam, thank God. "Cass, are you at your dorm?"

"Yeah," she sits up, blinking gingerly. The few hours' sleep seems to have eased her sickness, but she feels groggy as hell. It takes her a second to remember the spaceships in the sky. "Is it real - everything they're saying on the news?"

"Yeah. Cass, I can send a car to get you, but I can't come myself. Pack a few things, and be ready quick." Sam's voice is rushed; there are voices in the background and the line sounds gritty, busy. Cassie hears the methodical beeping of CPU systems.

"Ok. Is there a plan?" She can't help the fear creeping into her voice; though biologically alien, she's never really stopped to consider the fact that there are armies out there willing to blow a hole in the galaxy. Or that, once upon a time, they were willing to use her to do it.

"We've had a plan for years."

Cassie smiles, and uses her shoulder to prop her phone up while she throws clothes at random into her backpack.

"But Cassandra," Sam's voice flickers; Cassie figures that she's probably moving around the base, overseeing the end of the world from the frontline. "Any plan we have isn't something that's safe for you."

She feels her stomach drop at the thought of the alien substance that powers through her body; the sudden reminder of the naquadah that is as much a part of her as oxygen. The stuff of space and wonders, and man-made Stargates. She knows that, in any given disaster, the foremost plan would be to evacuate as many people as possible through the first habitable Gate destination: the President, business owners, scientists, army personnel. Everyone except alien time-bomb college students.

"But we'll keep you safe regardless, ok?"

Cassie is hesitant. "Ok. Are you sure you can't come?" She does her best to keep the need from filtering through, but she sits on her bed in a slump. She's sick and afraid, an alien on a planet full of terrified people; her mother is dead and the world is ending.

"I'm sorry sweetheart, we can't." The implication is clear: there was no chance that any member of SG-1 could get away from duty just to comfort her. Sometimes she forgets that they're not only her family; they're soldiers.

"Sure," she says, "Ok. I'll be fine."

(A blink, and she's twelve again, forehead-to-forehead with a tomboy Captain who is stroking her hair and trying to smile through her tears. "We are both very brave.")

"Just..." Cassie is hesitant, well aware that Sam is busy and needs to concentrate on saving the world, but also painfully anxious to hear her voice. "Promise me you won't leave me?"

There is silence, in which Sam considers what she's asking. She appears to be in the Gateroom, because Cassie hears the drone and whir of the chevrons locking into position. "I won't leave you Cassandra, you know that."

(Cassie's strongest memory from childhood is the heavy thumping of Sam's heart against her own, in those crazy few seconds before almost-death. Surviving genocide is unthinkable, impossible, something she still can't believe; it is the catch of Sam's breath as the clock ticks down that Cassie remembers with real ferocity, the realization that there was someone on this planet willing to die with her.)

Cassie makes a vague noise of assent. She knows it, but she can't be sure if it's because Sam loves her, or because she knows that Sam has no desire to Gate from Earth and leave it to burn.

"Daniel will meet you at the Washington facility, and I'll try and get there later today. At the very latest, I'll see you tonight."

"Ok. When will they strike?"

"Two days. If we're lucky."

Lucky? Cassie finds herself remembering 'Toronto' with surprising lucidity; the feel of the grass, her mother's singing, gold panning in the summer. She hasn't thought about it in years, but it's tucked away in her brain, brought out by shots to her hippocampus such as impending alien invasion. She thinks, with badly-contained hatred, that the Goa'uld and their kin aren't content with destroying her home planet; they're intent on blowing her sanctuary to pieces too.

"But we'll think of something," Sam continues, "we always do."

"Yeah," says Cassie, under her breath. She can barely count on her fingers the amount of time SG-1 have saved the world, never mind Stargate Command as a whole.

"I've got to go now Cassie," Sam is saying, footfalls almost obscuring the sound of her voice, "but I'll see you tonight, I promise."

"Ok. I love you."

"And I love you," Sam says, and Cassie doesn't doubt that. "Bye."

"Bye." Sam disconnects the call in a hurry, and Cassie is left staring at her shoelaces, tied in a haphazard knot. It is almost four am and her roommates are asleep, gathered in a crowd in the kitchen, coffee gone cold on the table in front of them. She passes them by in silence, dragging her backpack over her shoulder, and goes out to stare at the sky. The triangular ships are bigger now, more apparent, piercing through the bluish cosmos with frightening clarity.

She remembers Daniel telling her once that they are bigger than the great pyramids. They look tiny from so far away, hardly bigger than the moon, and maybe it's the anxiety, but she's certain she can feel the naquadah ticking around her body like a subcutaneous reminder of all the horrors that are out there.

She shrugs it off and walks further down the street with her shoulders hunched against the cold, fighting back tears and nausea and the desire to lie down on the ground and never get up. Her transport should be arriving soon, and the last thing she wants is for someone to report to Uncle Jack that she'd been crying. _General O'Neill_, she corrects herself, _I'm supposed to call him General O'Neill when the world is ending_.


	2. Desperation

**Well, the world didn't end. How disappointing. Still; I've got this fic to write, so yay for continued doom and gloom. I hope you enjoy this chapter :D**

* * *

Cassie and Daniel are sitting knee-to-knee in the back of a truck. The last time she asked, the driver yelled back that they were fifteen minutes from the base, and that was five minutes ago, and Cassie is mentally ticking down the seconds and cheering herself on for not breaking down in tears.

Daniel had covered the back windows with drapes. "We don't need to see that," he said, quickly, when Cassie first climbed into the car. His tone of voice had caught her attention and, instinctively, she cast one last look at precisely what Daniel was trying to protect her from: pearly lumescent hoverships, perched in the stratosphere, getting bigger by the minute.

Now, twenty minutes later, Daniel is still managing to keep up a strange air of nonchalance, as though impending alien invasion has ceased to interest him sometime in the last decade. Cassie hardly blames him.

"What's it like? Dying?"

He looks up, startled that she'd broken the silence. And with something so depressing too. She raises her eyebrow to get an answer from him, knocking her knee against his playfully.

"Cassandra, you're not going to die."

She laughes; _of course he'd say that_. "All evidence to the contrary."

He sighs. Cassie figures that death was something he had a tough time working out in his head; she'd been spared the details but knows enough to understand that there have been numerous times in which Sam and the others have grieved for Daniel. As a kid, he mystified her with his good humor and his calm eyes and his crazy theories, but the older she got, the more she came to empathize with the look of exhaustion he always seemed to have.

"I just want to know," she presses, "just in case."

"Fine," he says, leaning back against the cool leather seat, "What the hell, we'll be there in a few minutes anyway." He lookes at her for a while as though waiting for her to laugh and tell him it doesn't matter, but she gives him a small smile. It matters Daniel, please.

He nods. They'd had this conversation a hundred times or more, the pair of them conspiring in quiet whispers in the wake of her surviving genocide or of Janet's death, but Cassie knows this time is different; this time they aren't in a hospital waiting room or a bunk in the SGC, safe and sound and relatively okay – this time they are crouching under a sky loaded with pyramid ships. Every word he says now has real meaning; he has to be careful not to give her false hope.

"I died on Abydos. Did I ever tell you about Abydos?"

He had, frequently. "Your wedding to Sha're, and Skaara making moonshine, and Uncle Jack sending Kleenex through the Stargate." That part had always made her laugh.

He nods. "But, before that, when we first went through the gate, we encountered Ra. And I… died."

"Did it hurt?" She imagines the Jaffa staff weapon's blast cutting through his thin skin, his dirty archaeologist's clothes, muscle and bone until his heart stopped beating. She imagines him screaming, and dying, in much the same painful way that her mother had.

"I'd be lying if I said it didn't. Every time, it hurts, and I can never remember just how bad it feels. An all-over pain, like poison, and then you sleep."

Cassie isn't even aware that she's crying until she tastes salt on her lips. _So much for playing tough kid_. She swipes at her eyes angrily, hoping that Daniel won't notice.

Whether he does or not, he ignores her and continues speaking. "It's dark for a while, not just physically dark, but everything is sort of empty, like you're on pause for a while. And then, you come back."

"If you're lucky?"

"I don't know about lucky." He gestures skywards and Cassie feels the sharp reminder of what lurks above. The car slows down, and the driver is speaking into a crackly old walkie-talkie. They are almost there, Cassie is certain, and she is terrified of what she might see when she steps out. _How many ships are there now? How close?_

The driver stops the car altogether, and turns around to gesture at Daniel that they have arrived. "Tell me," Cassie says, urgent to speak before they are jostled out of the car, and separated in the crazy thrum that accompanies the end of the world. Daniel would be called to the frontline, and she would be closeted away in some back room with only a TV for company, she is sure. "What do you think our chances are? Be honest."

He pauses with a hand on the door. "Statistically, we'll probably survive the invasion. We've been in worse situations than this. But realistically, we're screwed. There are ships in the sky Cassandra; this is pretty hardcore right now. But, we can work it out."

"You're certain?"

"As certain as I ever am."

She barely has enough time to register the quick flash of guilt that coveres his face as his lies to her, before he throws the door open and steps out into the icy night.

"You're good at that," she says, hesitant to join him in the open air. She feels sick just thinking about how close the ships could have got in the twenty minutes since she last looked at the sky. She isn't sure what the protocol is during alien invasion; would anyone think less of her for wanting to close her eyes tight?

"At what?"

"Lying. I almost believe you."

"Hey," says Daniel, bending down so that his head appears in her frame of view again. "You _should_ believe me. I'm a genius." He gives her a goofy smile and extends his hand for her to take.

"And I'm an alien," she rolls her eyes, "what a pair we make." She takes his hand and lets him pull her up, deciding at the last minute to screw her eyes shut to avoid catching sight of the sky.

"Are you ok?"

"Just peachy," she grimaces, and forces herself to open her eyes. She doesn't want to be _that scared kid that can't even look at the spaceships_, she hasn't wanted to be that kid in over a decade. She keeps her eyes on the government building in front of them, all grays and smooth edges and shadows in the moonlight, and follows Daniel's calm, collected lead up the steps.


	3. Preparation

**Chapter 3 guys! Thank you for your lovely reviews; they really made my day :D Hope you like this one!  
**

* * *

As expected, Daniel abandons Cassie in the lobby of the government facility, a dozen faceless Airmen shuffling her this way and that, and Daniel mutters something about taking a call, disappearing from her side quicker than she can beg him to stay. He'd wrapped his jacket around her shoulders, and it is still warm as she cuts her way through the crowds, trying to console herself that _constantly bleeping computers don't mean everything's gone to hell,_ because it's all she can hear; the steady polytone duality of whirring machines.

Everything is hurried around her, people are shouting and passing things over her head, everyone is armed to the nines and the whole building stinks of panic and adrenaline. It's not something she's missed.

"Cassandra Fraiser."

She looks up. He must've been informed of her arrival, because Teal'c is standing there in his Air Force uniform, looking oversized and out of place, clutching a blinking PDA system.

She rushes to him, grateful to see a familiar face, and he grips her hand to prevent the sea of people from pulling them apart. "Cassandra Fraiser, I received news of your arrival."

"Hi."

He has a zat strapped to his belt, and she briefly wonders if he's going to get a chance to use it before the planet is destroyed. She feels her stomach roll, and presses a hand to her feverish forehead: despite everything that's happened, her cold still continues to worry its way through her immune system.

"Cassandra Fraiser, you look unwell. Do you require medication?"

"Advil, if you've got some?"

"There is some iso-butyl-propanoic-phenolic-acid in the back."

Her head feels woozy again, and she frowns at him. "Cool. Can you take me to Sam, or Jack?"

Teal'c nods firmly. "Colonel Carter is not yet here, but General O'Neill is in his office, this way." Still holding her hand, he steers her through long crowded corridors, past faceless Airmen who don't look much better than she feels. She wonders how Teal'c feels; he's stoic and serious, as ever, but she's sure he must be feeling some sense of urgency. Maybe spaceships in the sky just don't scare him anymore. They wind their way through the maze of the facility, until Teal'c deposits her before a closed door, framed by photographs of Presidents past and present, with large silver lettering on the door: General Johnathan J. O'Neill.

She wants to knock, but the formality has momentarily jarred her, so Teal'c does it for her, and her worries disappear as soon as she hears Jack's voice, annoyingly cheerful for such a depressing time.

"Hang on!" Cassie hears clattering as he gets up from the desk, and then he swings the door open, his huge grin practically hitting her in the face. "Cassandra!" He pulls her into an enthusiastic hug. "You look… sick."

"I am," she says, and coughs for effect.

Teal'c must have remembered the Advil, because he clears his throat. "I will bring your medication Cassandra Fraiser, and will return later."

"Yeah, see you later big guy," Jack waves him off, and then guides Cassie into the office, pointing to a chair.

She sits and shrugs Daniel's jacket off. It's a small office, but nicely decorated considering the fact that they're in an emergency facility. There are photographs on the desk, on the walls, on the windowsill that overlooks a grayish lawn. Through the window she can see the spaceships, huge now, as big as her hand. There are flowers on the windowsill, in a pretty opaque vase, although she thinks that probably wasn't Jack's idea.

"So, how about them spaceships?"

She blinks at him. Maybe it's the sickness, but she's really not in the mood to be bright and cheery at the end of the world. She shrugs.

"Look, Cassie, we've seen worse."

"I know."

"And we're doing everything we can."

"I know that, too."

"We have fighter jets prepped as we speak, ready to fire as soon as the ships enter the earth's atmosphere. Their fingers are literally on the red button." Even Cassandra knows how useless that is, like bows and arrows against a battalion.

"Good. Do we know who it is?"

"Not this time."

"Oh." They have names, and nicknames, for every alien race they've encountered, good and bad, and it makes her feel worse to think that the planet is going to be destroyed by some faceless race of nobodies. "Why don't you go through the gate? Sam said there was an evacuation."

"There was. But that's out of the question Cassie, you know that."

"The captain must go down with his ship, right?"

He nods, and Cassie feels a lump in her throat and casts haphazard prayers out that she won't start crying in front of her childhood hero. Through the window she can see that it's almost dawn, dim patches of orange are appearing on the horizon, and it's almost an insult that the sun can still rise on a day like this.

"You should probably get some sleep."

She shrugs. "How can I sleep when all this is going on?"

"You're sick kiddo, so at least try. By the time you wake up, Sam will be here, and you'll feel better then." She hears his unspoken meaning, and knows they'll _all _feel better once Sam is here. She nods.

"There's a good girl." He takes her arm and lifts her up out the chair, wrapping Daniel's jacket around her shoulders and leading her from the office, down a different set of blurry corridors. "The Airmen and other soldiers are all in standard bunks in the main facility, but we all have our own quarters. Kitchen, living room, king size beds. We even have an Xbox, which I'm hoping you'll show us how to hook up."

Cassie nods, feeling somewhat better. "What is this place, exactly?"

Jack pushes through another door, and they almost bump into a group of Airmen headed for the control room. They salute awkwardly in such a tight space, and Jack nods at them. "It's a bunker, to say the least. Trinium lined," he points up at the ceiling, "and our private quarters are cut underground."

"Like Cheyenne Mountain?"

"Kind of," he points at peeling wallpaper and mismatched paint on the doors, "only unfinished. This was kind of an emergency thing. And, look, home sweet home."

They have arrived in front of a plain white door, rather misshapen and definitely looking like it was constructed in a hurry. Cassie has little hope for its interior as she watches Jack fumble through his pockets.

"Keys, keys, keys," he mutters, "where'd I put them?" He pulls his hand out his pocket and proudly reveals a stick of gum, a Bluetooth earpiece and a string of keys tied together with bright pink twine. "Here we go!"

He unlocks the door and pushes her through first, and she is immediately met with a wash of warm air radiating from the temporary heater in the corner. The room is small, perhaps ten square feet, but it is certainly inviting, and her eyes are immediately drawn to the plushy couch pressed against the left hand wall.

He locks the door behind him and flicks a light switch; it is still quite dim, but Cassie can see the sharp edges of a flatscreen TV across from the couch, a coat rail, a small half-empty bookshelf, and a bunch of boxes stacked against the corner bearing Sam's handwriting: Living Room Stuff.

"It's nice," she declares, and it is. It has a homely feel to it that reminds her of Janet's house, it is small but comfy, and there are a lot of photographs lining the unpainted walls. She can recognize her childhood-self in some of them.

He beams at her, and takes her jacket, hanging it on the empty coat rail. "Doctor Jackson will probably come looking for that soon."

"He said he's busy."

"Yes, he's barely left the control room since we got here. He finds this all very exciting."

Cassie shudders at that. And then she yawns, a huge yawn she can't possibly fight. Her watch beeps as it turns six o'clock, and her eyes feel very heavy.

"To bed," Jack orders, "before you pass out standing up."

There are three doors on the wall opposite them, leading off into what Cassie assumes are the bedrooms and kitchen. Jack steers her towards the right hand door, pushing the door open to reveal a small box room with a queen bed, and a little cabinet underneath the window. He plucks her backpack off her shoulders and deposits it on top of the cabinet.

"You can unpack later, get some rest now."

She nods, sitting on the bed gratefully. It sinks underneath her; it is a comfortable bed, despite the fact that it was obviously placed here in a hurry. With her sickness, Cassie is certain that she'd find any bed comfortable.

"The kitchen is next door, if you wake up hungry. There's only microwave meals, noodles, and toast, I'm afraid. Sam should be here before you wake up though; I'll send her here right away. If you need anything, just call me on my cell, you have the number – right?"

Cassie nods. All the information is buzzing around her head; it'd be a lot to take in under normal circumstances, never mind with the flu, and the whole end-of-the-world thing. "Yeah, thanks. Good night."

"Night," he grins, and backs away out the door, deciding at the last minute to jump back in and press a kiss to her forehead. "Sweet dreams."

She rolls her eyes at the sky, alien spaceships and all. "Yeah right."

When he's gone, she kicks off her shoes underneath the bed and falls backwards, wrapping the comforter around her. Her head sinks into the pillows, and she bats at her teary eyes angrily._ This is no time for crying Cassandra; you're in a military facility. _And, really, that's still crazy to her, even after all these years; but there are spaceships in the sky telling her that nothing is going to be the same again, and she can't help but worry about what kind of world she's going to wake up to.


	4. Mobilization

Cassie dreams of fire and ice, a fitful purple sky, and she's running on wet padded earth, seeing rock formations around her that don't exist on earth – and that's when it hits her: she's dreaming of Hanka. She's wearing a dress she made herself and clinging to her dead father as though sheer force of will could bring him back to life.

She feels dizzy, sick-dizzy, like waking up too fast and falling back down. She clutches her mother for dear life, but her mother trips, landing on her arm, and Cassie hears the resultant crack of crashing bones. She wails, speechless in her panic, but her mother turns around and pushes her away.

"Run Cassandra!" She says, faintly. "Run fast, child." Cassie nods, terrified, and tries to run, but there are thorns grouping around her ankles and her lungs are tired, burning fire against her chest, and she falls to her feet, having the sense of mind to drag herself behind a thicket of shrubs.

When she wakes, she stares into the lifeless hoods of haz-mat suits, inside which are heroes whose names she doesn't yet know. They will take her through wormholes and scanner machines, to a different planet with playgrounds and toy stores and a dog she will name Buster.

In the dream-memory, she is shocked by a sudden wave of recognition: Jack, arms full of struggling dog, kneeling before her and passing the bundle to her. Buster licking her face, squirming in her arms, and Jack explaining this most prestigious of Earth Rules to her. Daniel's face, Sam's laugh, Teal'c's confusion – they'd all been taken aback by his gift.

Cassie feels fire, fire in her head, fire on her skin, sickness edging up and over and inside her throat, pressing against her lungs like a naquadah time bomb, and she screams and –

* * *

Cassie wakes up.

"Cassandra Fraiser!" Teal'c is at the door, tapping gently. He must have a key to Jack's quarters, because he knocks lightly on Cassie's bedroom door one last time. "Cassandra Fraiser, may I enter?"

She sits up, pushes her hair from her face and feels cold sweat. _Yuck. _She tries to gather her wits. "Sure Teal'c. Come in." He's like a vampire, she thinks, always waiting for permission.

When he walks in his is calm as always, holding a glass of water in one hand and, as he proffers his open palm to her, two tablets in the other.

"You remembered," she says, pleased.

"I rarely forget."

She swallows the medicine down gratefully; her headache is almost too much to bear. Teal'c awkwardly stands in the doorway until she pats her bed with a smile. He sits, and she hears the clatter of metal as he moves, the guns on his belt clicking against one another. She wonders if they'll give her a gun, when the time comes.

"Colonel Carter sent a message, just now."

"Oh?"

"Yes. She arrived on the base not ten minutes ago."

Cassie thinks of Sam's arrival, the cluster of airmen swallowing her up as they demand news and hope and battle plans. She thinks how afraid she must be feeling, not to mention exhausted.

"She says she will visit you imminently," Teal'c continues, "after debriefing."

"What time is it?" Cassie pushes aside the window drapes and is met by a full-blown blast of sunlight, informing her that it must be at least –

"Noon."

_Oh. _"I slept for quite a while, huh?"

"Indeed," Teal'c bows his head, "but the very sick require rest."

She nods, but she isn't entirely sure she feels all that sick today: sure, her head is on fire, but she thinks that once the ibuprofen kicks in she should be feeling almost normal. Well, except for the spaceships in the sky that is.

"What's the situation?" She points upwards, hoping Teal'c understands her meaning because she really doesn't feel up to asking how long it will be until the planet is attacked.

"They draw nearer, still. It is estimated that they will enter Earth's atmosphere at seven o'clock this evening; General O'Neill has the assault planned immediately."

She sighs. Not great news, but not entirely bad. She briefly wonders if she'll ever stop being terrified of alien invasion. She yawns, and is taken by surprise considering the amount of sleep she's had.

Teal'c stands up, nodding at her. "Cassandra Fraiser, you require breakfast and recuperation; I will leave you for now."

She smiles up at him; he probably has debriefing of his own to get to. He cups her face gently for a few seconds before giving her the faintest edge of a smile and ducking out the room.

Showered and in fresh clothes, Cassie feels much more like herself. She has pancakes browning in the toaster and makes the joyful discovery that Sam has somehow managed to sneak maple syrup into an Air Force base without it being stolen by sugar-craving Airmen. Or Jack.

Cassie pours a generous spoonful of it over her steaming pancakes, then adds a little more for good luck. _It's not like I'll be able to use it tomorrow._ She pauses for a moment, thinking about how morbid she's got in the past few days, then shrugs it off and goes into the living room.

The apartment doesn't have a dining room (or a bath, she discovered, sadly) so she perches on the edge of the couch and flicks through the TV channels, trying not to get maple syrup on the remote.

She's settled on some wacky game show when the door clicks open and Sam walks through, tired and windswept and still wearing her blues, but shockingly calm considering that the world is ending.

"Cass, you're here!" She says, in one stuttered breath, and Cassie has left her pancakes on the sofa and wrapped her arms around Sam before Sam has even dropped her briefcase.

"Oh god, sweetie, let me look at you," Sam pushes her back a little, fussing over her and hissing when she feels her high temperature.

"I'm fine," Cassie assures her, diving back into her hug. "I mean, aside from being sick and confused and quite a bit frightened." She breathes her words out into Sam's collarbone, not really realizing how afraid she was until now. Her stomach actually hurts with relief.

Sam looks down at her, and Cassie sees that she has tears in her eyes. _It must be bad. _"I was worried you wouldn't make it…"

"Daniel got me here last night. Or, well, this morning actually. I'm fine, Sam."

Sam gives her a small smile and squeezes her again, and Cassie wonders whether or not she'll stay with her when it finally happens.

* * *

She sits in the living room, knees against her chest, between Sam and Jack. On the other side of Sam is Daniel, and Teal'c sits on the arm of the couch beside Jack. Everyone is touching in some way: Daniel is holding Sam's hand, Teal'c has his hand on Jack's shoulder, and Sam and Jack both have their arms around Cassie. They are all silent, sitting closer together than is strictly necessary, but Jack muted the TV ten minutes ago as though he intended to speak but couldn't quite find the words.

Her watch beeps eight in the evening, and everyone jerks a little at the sudden sound. Cassie laughs uneasily. "Sorry."

Jack's walkie talkie crackles, and everyone looks to his lap where the little plastic box sits, buzzing haphazardly, the troops on the other end waiting for instructions.

"General?" Cam's voice flickers through, faint. He must be on the other side of the complex by now, and Cassie can hear the sharp rush of wind interfering with the signal. He must be outside, she thinks, waiting to start up his jet.

Jack picks it up. "I'm here Mitchell."

"Good. Jets are in position, at equidistant points surrounding the suspected entry points of the oncoming ships, sir. We have them boxed in, for want of a better phrase."

"Great news Colonel."

"Permission to fire?" Cassie hears the dual beeping of overworked computers as Cam paces to and fro in the control room.

Jack looks at Sam, who nods, and then presses a button on the walkie. "Permission granted Colonel. Blow 'em to kingdom come, kid."

"Received and understood, sir."

The device goes silent as Cam disconnects, hurrying off to give the orders, and Jack looks at Cassie, forcing a smile. "Now we wait."

"Now we wait," Sam echoes, leaning back against the couch. Cassie knows she'd rather be out there with Cam. She knows Sam doesn't feel entirely at ease with the staying-on-the-ground part of the plan, despite the fact that Cam has assured her repeatedly that she can do more good from here, that he's got everything completely under control.

They wait in silence, half-looking at the ceiling. They hear the steady thrum of engines as the few jets still stationed on earth take off to provide cover fire, and Cassie imagines Cam hunched down in the pilot's seat, his helmet knocking against the glass roof as he aimed for the sky. Flying makes her sick under normal circumstances; going off to fight a war is unthinkable.

There is a moment of silence when all remaining jets have taken off, and Cassie looks sideways at Jack. "What's happening now?"

"Cam will give the order to fire. Once he and his squad are in position, the troops in the air will release code-red tactical missiles and pumps those pesky invaders full of 'em. If all goes well, we'll get to see a pretty light show tonight when all the pieces start burning up in Earth's atmosphere."

"If all goes well…" She repeats, "And will it?"

He frowns at her. "I don't see why not." He pinches her knee lightly, "Shhh, just listen."

She can't hear anything, no matter how much her brain tries to convince her that she can hear the alien ships coming ever closer, and she's about to turn the TV on again just to block out the deafening silence, when Jack's walkie talkie crackles into life again as Cam gets the comms working in his jet.

"We are ready to fire sir, repeat: ready to fire. Our targets are locked, and we have them in center sight." He sounds confident, which puts her at ease for a second before she realizes that Cam could feel confident in pretty much any situation. She shuffles, waiting for Jack's response, and can't begin to imagine how agitated Colonel Mitchell must be feeling.

"Fire at will, Colonel." Jack looks giddy, and elbows Cassie conspiratorially. "I've always wanted to say that."

They hear further interference over the line as Cam connects to his secondary comms device, addressing his troops. "You heard the General guys: let 'em go. Roberts," he says to the airman manning his jet's gunner, "Shoot to kill."

The sound becomes increasingly distorted as all they can hear is Cam's excited breathing and the roar of engines as his repositions his jet – and then, overpoweringly loud, Cassie hears the release systems operating the missiles, then the woosh of weaponry - and a sudden, painful silence, followed by an almightly loud crash, and the crackling of disturbance over the walkie talkie, and then Cam's suddenly clear and incredibly loud swearing.

"Excuse me, Colonel?" Jack raises an eyebrow and they all share a quiet laugh in the interim.

"Sorry sir, but that really was remarkable. You should've seen it."

Sam bristles a little, itching to be out there on the frontline.

Daniel goes to the window and throws open the drapes. There are at least a dozen ships in the sky now, surrounded by yellowish white glows: the aftershocks from the missiles leaving imprints in the velvet sky.

"Did we get them?" He says to Jack, who repeats the question over the walkie.

"I don't know sir," Cam's voice is rushed as he navigates his jet, frantically pressing buttons to clear his field of vision, "Everything is obscured up here… There's a lot of debris, that's for sure."

Sam takes the device from Jack. "The first blast might've just destroyed their shield generators – fire again, to be sure."

"Alright troops," Cam instructs, "Prep the launchers for take two."

He falls silent for a while, bringing the jet around to fire again, until the woosh of rockets obscures the walkie, and Jack grabs the device back. "What the hell was that Mitchell?"

"I don't know sir – I didn't give the order," he flips comms again, addressing the squad. "Who the hell fired? Johnson? Mills?"

"It wasn't us sir," Roberts's voice flickers through over the walkie, faint, from the back of Cam's jet. "Look sir."

Teal'c tenses as they wait for Cam's reply, and Daniel points wordlessly out the window: thin streaks of light cut through the night sky, disappearing as fast as they appear. Missiles, Cassie recognizes: she'd know that sight anywhere.

"Are they…?" Sam begins, frowning. Daniel looks nauseous, but Cassie is confused; she's lost track of what's going on.

"Oh my god," Cam's voice cuts through the disturbance on the line again, reverent now, almost fearful. "Oh my god, General, _they're _firing at _us._"

Jack breathes in quick. "Understood. Retreat Colonel, repeat: fall back."

Cam doesn't waste time acknowledging Jack's orders, instead he immediately yells for his troops to fall back, the comm line becoming distorted with the sound of speeding engines as he powers the jet into a 180 degree turn.

The lightning-fast missiles start up again, high-pitched and heavily jumbled over the comms device, and all they can hear is the thudding sounds of impact. Cassie feels like she might throw up any second: they're listening to a massacre.

"Oh god," Cam shouts, "Roberts!" They hear one final high-powered impact until the comms line crackles out entirely and is replaced by white noise.

They sit in silence for a few seconds, Daniel still standing open mouthed by the window, until Jack makes for the door at a run.

"Damn!" He swears, before disappearing down the corridor, and Sam runs after him, quickly followed by Teal'c.

Cassie, abandoned on the couch, is still trying to figure out what the hell just happened, and Daniel looks like he might faint by the window. He's still staring, speechless, at the evening sky, now clouded in a haze of smoke and debris. Cassie feels sick to her stomach as she realizes that Jack was right: they'll get a pretty show all right, but it's their own ships that are crashing down to Earth.


	5. Doctor Fraiser

Cassie only has to follow the panic to find the control room. She is carried along by the crowds until she reaches the base's central hub, and airmen are milling around in droves, talking into earpieces and rubbing their heads at CPUs. She is suddenly aware that no one has a clue how the mission went so wrong.

Sam is at the center of the fray, a phone jammed against her ear as she barks instructions to the second wave of jets waiting to take off. "This is a salvage mission only, troops, no heroics now."

"What can I do?" Cassie feels useless, and is tired of feeling useless.

Sam hangs up the phone and doesn't even look at her when she talks. "Keep out of the way Cassandra, please. Go back to our quarters."

Cassie nods and walks away, but doesn't head for their quarters, instead she cuts her way down crowded quarters to the medical bay. She can't let herself just sit and wait for the world to end while her entire family are on the frontline, and Cam might very well be dead.

The medical bay is small, but clean, and completely empty. She briefly wonders where the medics are, but within seconds the room is full of doctors wheeling gurneys, wounded soldiers occupying every space possible. There must have been at least thirty men in Cam's squadron, not counting those who weren't drafted in but who couldn't sit back and watch. At first count, Cassie counts forty bodies, some of whom aren't moving, others who are trying to get on their feet and back to the fight.

She sees Vala by the door, straddling a gurney, clumsily applying pressure to a gushing wound.

"What's his name?" Cassie asks, taking the gauze from Vala to inspect the man's injuries. It doesn't look good, the man isn't moving, and Cassie realizes, with her heart in her throat, that he's already dead. Cooling blood pools up and out of his wound, covering Vala's inexpert hands.

"Airman Roberts. I don't know his first name. He flew with Colonel Mitchell." Vala is still trying to stem the bleeding, and Cassie covers her hands with her own.

"He's gone Vala. We can't save this one."

Vala sobs and climbs off the gurney, wiping at teary eyes and streaking blood across her forehead.

A medic pushes up against Cassie, pronouncing Roberts's death, and Vala slips away into the madness.

"Are you injured?" Yells the medic.

"No," Cassie can barely find her voice. "I'm a doctor. Well, not exactly. Third year med student."

The medic half-laughs in relief, "That's better than nothing. We'll take anyone with a crash course in First Aid. Scrub in, Doctor…?"

"Fraiser," Cassie says, and can barely believe the words are coming out of her mouth, "I'm Doctor Fraiser." Medicine wasn't exactly the career she had in mind, but the science gave her something to think about and she still wasn't exactly sure of all the jobs available on earth beside those her mother had told her about. And her mother had dropped more than enough hints along the years about going into medicine so that, after her death, Cassie really wasn't sure if she had any other option.

"Well then Doctor Fraiser, get to work," the medic hands her a pair of gloves and rejoins the main chaos in the center of the room.

* * *

Sam finds her, hours later, patching up Cam's head wound. He got off lightly, to say the least. A broken arm and a few cracked ribs took the brunt of his weight as his jet crashlanded on its tail end in the ground; Roberts was killed on impact. Cam is stable, but shaken.

Sam presses a kiss to his forehead and takes his hand as she turns to Cassie, whispering, "How many are dead?"

"More than half. I've counted thirteen who are stable, and four more still in surgery."

Sam looks like she might swear for a moment, but turns to smile at Cam. "Hey you. We need you back on your feet."

"What's the situation?" He winces as he talks, upsetting his broken ribs, and Cassie pushes a little more morphine into his IV.

"You destroyed one ship, and eliminated the generators on most of them, or so Daniel figures. But there are only eleven ships out there now; the other one is burning up as we speak."

Cam coughs. "So these men died for nothing?"

"Not exactly," Sam says, "You've slowed them down."

"Great," he coughs again, "We get to wait a few extra days to die." He coughs and splutters, and Cassie hands him a cup of water.

"Try not to talk, Colonel. Maybe we could leave this until later?" She suggests.

Sam nods. "Get some rest, Cam. I'll go tell General O'Neill you're awake, and check in with you later." She kisses him again, and turns to Cassie. "Stay safe, honey, I'll come find you later."

"Okay," Cassie says, but follows Sam a few steps so that they're out of Cam's earshot.

"Is there a Plan B?"

"The only other plan we have ends in definite destruction." Sam sounds serious, like death and destruction is something unavoidable this late in the game.

"Oh?" Cassie hopes Sam might elaborate, but Sam gives her a sad smile and turns away, and Cassie can only wonder what the hell kind of plan she's got up her sleeve. She's been around SG1 for long enough to know that they usually have pull some wacky plan out of the bag at the last minute, but she's never seen Sam act so fearful of one of those plans until now.

* * *

That night, Cassie watches a news bulletin on a loop on the TV, and gets to witness the failed Air Force strike in stunning HD. It makes her feel sick, to know that most of these men died tonight right in front of her eyes, but she can't stop looking. She sits in the armchair, a plate of noodles and bacon going cold on the table beside her.

Sam and Jack are on the couch, exhausted, but determined to stay awake. In the sky outside, the ships are the size of small automobiles now, and Cassie knows that if she muted the TV and held her breath, she'd be able to hear their thrumming engines bringing them closer.

"How's Vala?" She asks, just for something to say. The last time she saw Vala, she'd locked herself into an empty room to escape from the horror of the medical bay, and Cassie couldn't blame her.

"Daniel's with her," Sam says, quietly. "This is difficult for her. It's difficult for all of us, but Vala…"

"I get it," Cassie says, and really does get it. Vala feels responsible; Vala _always _feels responsible. Cassie too has never felt less human than she does right now, waiting for an alien race to cut their planet apart. She wants her mother – both of them. She takes a deep breath, wondering how to phrase this next part. "Do you think the ships will fire? From where they are now – in the sky?"

Sam considers for a moment. "No. I honestly think they would have done, but after what we did today, they probably want to take us out face to face."

"Wipe out Stargate Command, and _then _destroy the planet?"

Jack stirs on the couch, leaning forward to rest his elbows on his knees. "They're not taking any chances this time kiddo."

"Oh." She waits a minute or two before asking, "And what's your mysterious Plan B?"

Sam and Jack look at one another, and then at the TV. "You won't like it," Sam says, "I'm not even sure I like it."

Cassie feels sick; she certainly doesn't feel twenty-six. "Tell me, please."

Sam elbows Jack, who meets Cassie's eyes. "In case of emergency, there are deposits of C-4 placed in strategic points throughout our defense bases here on Earth. Alongside its self-destruct mechanism, there's a great deal of C-4 in Cheyenne Mountain, a lot inside the Pentagon, a lot on board the George Hammond and… a helluva lot here."

"And?" Cassie isn't sure she follows.

"They're all wired to a remote detonator, which we have here with us in this facility. All it takes is the push of a button and we have a pretty darn big explosion waiting to happen."

_Oh. _"And you think the aliens will concentrate on landing here, or at Cheyenne Mountain, or at the Pentagon?"

"I'm almost certain," he says, with as much certainty as when he used to deny aliens would ever invade. "Not all of them will come here right away, but a great deal will. And it's either detonate the C-4 then, or sit back and watch them destroy us."

"Huh," Cassie says, "Some choice."

Jack laughs. "Y'think? I'm the guy that's gotta tell some poor sucker to push the button. I'm the one who's gotta decide whether we do this or not."

Sam flinches. "Can we… not? Let's just leave the doom and gloom talk until the morning, please?"

Jack sighs, and nods, and Cassie crawls over onto the couch to curl up against Sam's side, knowing full well what Sam had meant by that: in the morning they might well all die – tonight could be their last.

"It's funny," Cassie keeps her voice quiet, "I don't think I can sleep."

"Me neither."

"Nor me."

Jack gets up for a blanket and they spend the night curled together, watching the same five-minute-long news snippet wheel around on the TV on mute, Jack's fingers carding through Sam's hair, counting the beeps on Cassie's watch until morning comes.


End file.
